


Covering Fire

by rain_sleet_snow



Category: Primeval
Genre: Christmas, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Gen, Male-Female Friendship, Overly Persistent Ex-Boyfriend, Snowed In
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-17
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-30 08:39:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17825492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rain_sleet_snow/pseuds/rain_sleet_snow
Summary: "So," Jenny said, when they were tucked up in bed (both wearing pyjamas and drinking Harry's husband's whisky hot chocolate; Jenny felt like a giggly seventeen-year-old at a sleepover). "Where do I find someone like you, but straight?""Fuck knows," Becker said comfortably. "Where the hell did you dig up that human jelly baby?"***When your life tries to take a turn for the semi-creepy Christmas rom-com, it's good to have a reliable fake boyfriend on hand.





	Covering Fire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fififolle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fififolle/gifts).



"So these are good friends of yours," said Becker, on the motorway going north. Rutland was not all that handy for Becker's destination - Leicester, to visit his best friend and her family - but the anomaly team stuck close to each other, these days. Stephen wasn't going to get in trouble because Abby wouldn't allow it; Abby wouldn't get in trouble because Connor would ask her not to; and since the three of them took their holidays together Lester had no concerns about them. Sarah and Danny were on the clock, Lester had Lyle watching his back, Nick was beyond anyone's help, and Jenny was...

Jenny was by herself, which was why Becker was giving her a lift to a really awkward house party.

"No," Jenny said. "Not really." She paused, and added: "Alexia's my cousin."

Becker made an encouraging noise.

"Her husband Fred, and his brother and sister - they were friends of Mike's and mine."

"Mike. Your former fiancé?"

Jenny nodded and stared into the snow. It was probably for the best that Becker was driving her. Her car was not up to this weather, but Becker's relentless old LandRover Defender was, and his driving was also more tuned to difficult conditions than hers. And she was glad not to be arriving alone, at the very least.

Fred, Alexia, Sophie, Sophie's wife Isobel, Harry and his rotating cast of boyfriends - they'd always told Jenny they thought Mike could be a bit of a dick, they'd questioned the engagement so gently it felt like an insult at the time, and they'd supported her, but still, this was going to be awkward. And Jenny had had some experience with awkwardness, considering that she'd once come face to face with her then-boyfriend's ex-wife and been told that she was some kind of weird time-travelling reincarnation of the aforesaid boyfriend's previous girlfriend. Helen gave Jenny a headache, but at least she didn't have to spend Christmas with her.

"So," Becker said, into the semi-silence. The radio was crackling away quietly; it would be enough to stave off conversation if Becker weren't persistent. "Why are you spending Christmas with your ex's friends?"

"Well -" Jenny began, and sighed, and slumped back in her seat. "I don't know. I could go to my parents but my father makes my teeth hurt and my mother's still mourning the prospect of grandchildren disappearing over the horizon. And most of my friends became Mike's friends. Or, well, I drifted apart from the people who didn't like him, because I was working all the time, and Mike handled our..." She waved a hand. "Social life. Alexia and Fred issued the invitation, I accepted, I'm sure we'll have a lovely time."

Becker digested this in silence. "Well, you know who to call if you need an excuse to evacuate."

Jenny laughed. Becker was a good man, and he knew how to be a good friend to women. "It'll be fine. Don't worry about me. I'm an adult." So far, based on previous experiences chez Clan Farnborough-Lott, Jenny was most worried about Harry's cooking and Sophie's home-brewed moonshine, but she supposed there was the outside possibility that Alexia was concerned enough - or her mother was nosy enough - to have arranged the presentation of Eligible Men for her attention. Arriving with a handsome, thoughtful colleague would put a stop to that.

The radio was going on and on about the weather. Becker turned the volume up two notches and listened with a frown on his face.

"Will you make it to Leicester?"

"I’ve driven in worse."

"Hmm," Jenny said, tucked herself further into the villainous crocheted blanket Becker had given her for warmth, and waited for them to arrive.

The first thing that happened when they arrived at Lott Farm - a deceptive name for a well-restored manor house with lovely gardens and a thriving line in Weddings and Occasions - was that Isobel bolted out of a side door and hurtled in their general direction, intercepting Jenny before she could reach the porch. Dressed in an apron and Ugg boots over jeans and cashmere, she clearly wasnot ready for a trip into the snow, but equally clearly it was an emergency.

"What the fuck?" Jenny and Becker said, not quite in unison. 

"Jenny, thank God I caught you," Isobel said. "I'm so sorry, we couldn't get you on the phone or we'd have warned you earlier, but we had no idea until he turned up, and there are no more trains till tomorrow. I swear, none of us invited him."

"Oh God," Becker said, picking up Jenny's weekend case like it's a cudgel. "Good thing I came with you, Jenny."

Isobel's admiring look was understandable. Becker looked good with his cheeks flushed by the cold and his hair disarrayed by the wind, and besides, he was carrying around Jenny's things in a manly and helpful fashion. 

"It's all right, Isobel," Jenny said soothingly, still a bit at sea. Isobel was a bit odd but she was reliable, and Jenny couldn’t work out what would get to her like this - and besides, Jenny was not as good an actor as Becker. "I'll be fine!"

"You should have told us you were bringing someone," Isobel said, half-teasing. Jenny took a breath, paused, and was still contemplating how best to explain Becker (friend? Colleague? Long-lost half-brother? Schoolfriend?) when Becker piped up and did it himself.

"I'm just passing through on the way to family in Leicester," he said, sounding more hearty and Home Counties than usual. Becker's usual vocal affect was located somewhere between Tom Hiddleston and Lord Vetinari, when he wasn't screaming blue murder at a dinosaur. "So of course I offered Jenny a lift."

"Chivalry is not dead!" Isobel said brightly, and on the porch the front door opened. The golden light spilling out haloed the form of Jenny's ex-fiancé, as if he deserved anything of the sort.

"Well shit," Jenny said, understanding Isobel's panic at last.

Becker's hand on her shoulder was very comforting.

"Jenny," Mike said, confronting her on the other side of the mistletoe hung over the front door. ( _Damn_ Harry and his romantic notions.) 

"Hello, Mike," Jenny says. Isobel slid past them and ran up the stairs, yelling for Alexia and Fred with panic imperfectly concealed under a bright voice. "Fancy seeing you here."

"I hoped I’d find you here." Mike looked just as stolid as ever. To think she once thought that meant he was nice and reliable, as opposed to deeply predictable and set in his ways.

"Hey, Jen, you're in the way," Becker said from behind her ear, with a teasing affection in his voice.

"Oh - sorry," Jenny said belatedly, sidling into the house, leaving Mike face to face with Becker. They were the same height, but Becker was ten years younger and didn't stoop, and in the light his casual physical fitness and careless good looks made an unflattering contrast against Mike's late-thirties thinning hair and stockbroker chic. If Mike assumed they were together he'd think Jenny had traded him in for a younger model - which to be fair, if Becker had been straight and interested, and if Jenny hadn't been taking a break from men to focus on therapy, she absolutely would have done.

"Becker." Becker introduced himself casually, with the kind of easy, smug charm that made a lot of men want to break his nose. The grudging way Mike shook hands suggested that included him. "I'm a... friend of Jenny's. Pleased to meet you."

Becker touched the small of Jenny's back with a light hand, and produced her phone. "Jen, you dropped this in the car."

She absolutely had not, but she took it back from him anyway. "Thank you, Hil," she said, trying to convey _what the fuck are you doing and why did you pickpocket my phone_ through meaningful eyebrows alone. If that didn’t do it, maybe purposefully using the first name he hated would get her point across. "I'll forget my own head next."

Becker chuckled and squeezed her waist lightly; she leaned into him, because it felt friendly, and because after everything Mike had said when she gave back the ring about her having a mid-life crisis she felt like making the bastard sweat.

If Mike had looked devastated, she'd feel guilty about it; but he didn't, he looked sullen. Jenny Laos a hand on Becker's arm, which had the twin effect of making them look intimate and showing off the gleaming, glittery navy blue manicure she'd done on the way here. Mike had approved of reds, pinks and nothing else, and if Jenny was going to be a hussy who'd upgraded to a handsome man ten years younger than the fiancé she jilted, she was going to do it in style.

Fred nearly fell down the last flight of stairs in his haste to intervene.

"Wow," he said, regaining his footing by crashing into Mike. "Jenny, so good to see you! We were worried about you driving in that storm! Happy Christmas! Who's this?"

Dinner was both heroically awkward and very funny. Becker had the liver to withstand Sophie's gin, and he was having a lot of fun being hilarious at Mike's expense. Not openly, of course; Becker knew how to be sly. It had always been one of Jenny's favourite things about him. 

She'd feel bad, but Alexia had cornered her in the kitchen to apologise again for Mike's presence, and said that Mike had been talking about staying for a couple of days, until the weather calmed down. Now he was insisting he would leave first thing in the morning; Becker had even offered to drive him to the station, which Alexia and the others might think was gracious of him, but Jenny knew was Becker's way of getting Mike out of her orbit. He'd probably wait until the train had gone and clear the station to make sure Mike was on it before he drove on. The original plan had been for Becker to leave immediately, before the snow got any thicker, but Harry and Fred insisted the weather was too bad. Becker acquiesced politely and swapped tips on snow driving with them. Mike, who could drive any sports car you cared to name but couldn't get a wheel out of a ditch, scowled his way through the discussion.

Jenny, who'd known Harry and Fred any time the last five years, thought that they actually just didn't want to deal with Mike's drama, and the fact that Becker - Jenny's supposed new boyfriend - was sticking to Jenny like glue was a great drama-suppressant. Mike very obviously thought Becker would beat him up if he gave Jenny any shit, and though Jenny was sure Mike had assumed the wrong motives, she was equally sure he was right.

Neither Becker nor Jenny had needed to say that they were dating: they merely allowed people to draw their own conclusions, Becker playing the casually thoughtful date, and Jenny going along with it. It was surprisingly fun, and not nearly as awkward as it would have been if she'd tried this with Nick, or someone else she might actually have gone out with. Becker had zero romantic interest in her, but a gay man with enough close female friends, it turned out, might know more about acting considerate than a straight one. This archaeologist best friend of Becker's must have taught him well. He hardly touched Jenny - one light hug, one kiss on the cheek, one light touch on her shoulder - but he managed to look like the perfect new boyfriend. 

"So," Jenny said, when they were tucked up in bed (both wearing pyjamas and drinking Harry's husband's whisky hot chocolate; Jenny felt like a giggly seventeen-year-old at a sleepover). "Where do I find someone like you, but straight?"

"Fuck knows," Becker said comfortably. "Where the hell did you dig up that human jelly baby?"

Jenny snorted her laughter into her hot chocolate and steadied it before it spilled. Outside, someone's footsteps paused before carrying on. She imagined one of her hosts talking to the others - _all that and he even makes her laugh_. "Don't call him that."

"It was that or, you know, a chipolata stuffed into chinos, and I thought that might give the wrong impression."

"Never a truer word spoken," Jenny said emphatically, realised what she'd implied, and tried to stifle a laugh. 

Becker was sniggering shamelessly.

"I forget where we met," Jenny said, as if that would shut Becker up. "I think we were set up by friends."

"Are you sure they were your friends?"

Jenny aimed a half-hearted smack at Becker's shoulder. "I used to like him very much," she said.

"But you snapped out of it, thank God."

Jenny shrugged. "Look, I used to like - boring, and secure. I thought that was what I wanted."

"Oops," Becker said callously.

"Well," Jenny said. "We all make mistakes."

"I'll drink to that," Becker said, more fervently than Jenny expected, but she just laughed at him, and clinked her mug with his in a toast. 

"Thanks for the rescue," Jenny said. "This would have been a pain if you hadn't been here."

"Any time."

The next morning Isobel said how glad she was that Becker made Jenny laugh, and was he, incidentally, as handsome undressed as he was dressed?

Jenny had never seen Becker in any greater déshabille than last night, wearing a hideous pair of tartan pyjama pants and a t-shirt with an obscure chess joke on it. "I don't kiss and tell," she said, straight-faced, and caught Becker's eye as he came into the kitchen.

Becker winked, which could mean any number of things.

_ Go team _ , Jenny thought, and laughed into her tea.


End file.
